


The Secrets We Know (and some we don't)

by SuperWhoAvengeTrekLock



Series: Supernatural As Told by Me: If Cas Was Always There [11]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Just... lots of angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-24
Updated: 2017-08-24
Packaged: 2018-12-19 13:35:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11898837
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuperWhoAvengeTrekLock/pseuds/SuperWhoAvengeTrekLock
Summary: More secrets, I know you're dying for that! In this installment we have the gang chasing down Andy and tackling that part of the dynamic. In this chapter, we get a really big chunk of what Castiel has been hiding from Dean because it's eating him alive and he's not sure how to cope. Meanwhile Sam is trying to figure out how best to keep Gabe in the loop without telling him about his visions of him, and Dean is trying to figure out what it means for him and everyone else if Sam turns out to be just like the psycho's they met.





	The Secrets We Know (and some we don't)

**Author's Note:**

> So I am so sorry. This is long overdue. I've had some crap going on in my life but it's over now and hopefully these will be coming more regularly again. Thank you to those who stuck with me :*

Sam still hadn’t told Gabriel about his visions. He didn’t know why but… he simply couldn’t bring himself to do it. He wondered if it was because he thought– hoped– that any day now, Gabriel would wise up and leave. He would leave their screwed up world and go be normal. Nab a wife, a house, have two-point-five kids. He wanted normalcy for the other, a future that he’d once dreamt of but… couldn’t get back to. Not now. 

That being said, normalcy seemed to be anything but what Gabriel wanted. He and Cas were so much alike in the sense that the smaller of the four was  _ excelling _ at hunting. He never before thought that he might have needed to step up his game, but when Gabriel and Cas were involved… it was impressive. 

Sam didn’t know how that made him feel. It was the same when they learned that Castiel was so good. He chalked it up to having great trainers, guiding them. But what did that say about them? What did it say about the fact that they didn’t try to stop them? He knew why Dean accepted Cas… but why hadn’t he pushed Gabriel away more? Why hadn’t he done better?

He supposed it was for some of the same, selfish, reasons Dean didn’t push Cas away: he wanted Gabriel around. He wanted Gabriel to stay because not only did it add a fourth wheel to their lives so he wasn’t always alone with the couple, but he liked Gabriel’s playful manner. Sure, sometimes it was inappropriate and Gabe couldn’t always read a room. But he found it endearing at times. It was even more hilarious how fast he could get under his brother’s skin. 

A lot of it, something Sam didn’t want to admit, had to do with his visions. He hadn’t been able to help Gabriel, no matter how desperately he wanted to. He still felt that guilt. He still felt like the fact that Gabriel had been tortured for so long was because he hadn’t been smart enough, good enough, to find him. 

So Sam hadn’t told Gabe about his secret vow because doing so meant admitting his fault. It meant admitting that he wasn’t good enough yet the other man was counting on him to keep him safe, that much he knew. So what would Gabriel say to him? What would he think of him? Would he think him a freak like Dean did at times? Or would he be more forgiving?

Of course, when the four of them kept secrets… they always had a habit of coming out whether they like it or not. 

Sam could remember the last time he’d had a vision. It was when they’d almost had the demon. It had been painful, they were always painful… but this one had been as long as it had been when they met Max and that in itself was scary. 

He’d been in a gas station bathroom, just going before they got back on the road, when the vision had hit. So much was going on; death, mostly. It rocked him to his core so hard that if left him doubled over the dinghy sink, gasping and running water on his face. 

The vision had Sam reeling, to say the least. He hated this. He hated knowing about death before it happened. Sure, it came in handy sometimes like when they’d saved Monica and her baby. But then there were other times where he couldn’t help anyone… like Gabriel. 

Just then, Dean opened the door. “Sam, come on, zip it up. Let’s hit the–” he stopped as he saw his brother, seeing the state he seemed to be in. “Road,” he finished absentmindedly. He knew that look. He knew the look his brother had in his eyes. “What?” he asked.

 

“So you have visions… and you didn’t think that was something I might have wanted to know?” Gabriel asked from the backseat as he crossed his arms. “I thought we had this rule that there weren’t going to be any secrets with us?” he asked. “So does that just apply to one or…” he trailed off, clearly angry. 

Sure, Gabriel hadn’t been with them as long as Cas had. But he figured that when it came to things like that, they were supposed to be honest with each other. That was the sales pitch, after all. So if Sam, of all people, was keeping secrets from him… what did Cas and Dean have up their sleeves?

Of course… that thought made him sink a little. In his own way… he and Cas had a secret too. A secret he was only keeping because his brother swore him to secrecy. He hated keeping it bottled up, prolonging the inevitable when the Winchester boys would find out and be that much more upset that they weren’t told. 

Sam sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose because Gabriel was right. He didn’t like secrets. “I’m sorry, Gabe. Really,” he said from his spot next to him, having given Cas the front so that he could talk to him. “I kind of figured you might know already, from being with us,” he half lied. Yes, some parts of him believed Gabriel already knew. And other parts knew that he didn’t. 

“Don’t  _ assume _ , Sam. I didn’t know. But it would have been nice to know when y’all were selling that schtick about being honest with each other and ‘as a family’ having no secrets from each other. I mean, is it ‘cause I’m the new guy? No one wants to talk to me?” But still, the words tasted wrong on his tongue when he was keeping someone else’s secret. He was… a hypocrite. 

“God, no, Gabe. That wasn’t what it was about,” he rushed to say. But he quickly paused. He wasn’t ready. He wasn’t ready to tell Gabriel about his visions of the other, about the way he’d swore that now that they had him… he would protect him. He saw the way Gabe looked at him, as if waiting for him to tell him what it was truly about. But he couldn’t seem to. 

So Dean swooped in, though it was with more conflict. “I don’t know, man. Maybe we should chill out, think about this.”

Sam frowned. “What’s there to think about?”

Dean sighed as he drove. “I just don’t know that going to the Roadhouse is the best idea.”

Sam was a little upset by his brothers reaction. Helping people was what they did. People needed help. “Dean… this is gonna happen. And Ash can tell us where.”

“Yeah, man, but–”

“Plus it could have some connection with the demon. My visions always do,” he muttered, trying not to look at Gabriel.

“That's my point,” Dean started again. “There's gonna be hunters there. I don't know if-if-if going in and announcing that you're some supernatural freak with a-a demonic connection is the best thing, okay?” Dean said, clearly without thinking. 

The car was quiet for a moment. The lot of them had heard it, had picked it out. Out of all the words Dean had just said… the word freak stood out: angry and yelling. 

Sam felt a pang of hurt in his chest when his brother called him that. His brother was supposed to be the one to pat him on the back and tell him that everything was going to be okay. Not call him names and make him feel worse at the fact that he wasn’t just normal. 

Castiel felt it too. He’d been worried, all this time. He’d been worried that when everything came out, Dean wouldn’t accept him. That Dean would turn and run, hightail it away from him… and that would be the end of it. Because Dean would think him a freak. This just proved he was right…

“So I'm a freak now?” Sam asked, clearly hurt.

Dean backpedaled, putting on a fake smile as he reached back to whack the other gently. “You've always been a freak.”   
  


 

Once they’d gotten the information from Ash, they were back on the road again. The car was quiet at first, everyone afraid to say something as this wasn’t just any hunt. This was a hunt for a kid that had abilities just like Sam did. 

You see, Sam knew to look for what he had Ash dig up. He knew because… this was how it went. All his visions… they always led him to the demon or somewhere that had to do with the demon. He knew that when Gabriel got captured, it must have had something to do with the demon. That’s just the way it was. 

But now… now it wasn’t just about a demon. It was about someone doing bad things with their abilities. He’d seen it once before. He didn’t want to see anyone die because of this. Not this time.

He had been lost in his own headspace when he heard a voice; his brothers. He looked over to see Dean looking at him expectantly. “So? Whaddya got?” he asked. 

Sam breathed in as he looked down at the file. “Andrew Gallagher. Born in eighty three, like me. Lost his mother in a nursery fire exactly six months later... also like me,” he muttered. 

Gabriel was a little floored. He knew what had happened with their mother and the demon, even Sam’s college girlfriend. He knew what had happened to them and it was tragic, unbelievable, and that the same demon almost did the same thing to Cas. What he didn’t know was that… clearly Sam had some sort of knowledge about this guy in some way. He knew what to look for even though all he had to go off of was a vision of a guy shooting someone and then shooting himself. 

And Gabriel… he didn’t feel like he was getting the whole story. Not completely. 

“You think the demon killed his mom?” Dean asked. 

Sam nodded. “Sure looks like it,” he muttered. 

Dean furrowed his brow in thought. “How did you even know to look for this guy?” he wondered out loud. 

Sam paused a beat. “Every premonition I've had, if they're not about the demon they're about the other kids the demon visited. Like Max Miller, remember him?”

Dean gave a humorless chuckle. “Yeah, but Max Miller was a pasty little psycho.”

“The point is he was killing people. And I was having the same type of visions about him. And now it could be happening all over again with this Gallagher guy,” Sam said definitively.

Castiel touched his shoulder. “What about your other visions?” he asked. “You saw–” Castiel cut himself off. He cut himself off as soon as he saw the look on Sam’s face. So Sam  _ still _ hadn’t told Gabriel. Interesting. 

“Saw what?” Gabriel demanded. The car was quiet, no one seeming to want to answer. Gabriel clenched his jaw as so many thoughts ran through his head. He simply shook his head and grabbed headphones from his bag. “Whatever. Ignore me. I’m used to it at this point,” he muttered and put his music on. 

Sam had turned in his seat, immediately feeling guilty… but when the older Novak put his hood up so he couldn’t see anyone and sunk to the corner of the backseat… he knew he wasn’t listening anymore. Shit.

Dean breathed a sigh. He’d begun to think they were all on relatively good terms. He’d begun to hope they’d stay that way. Apparently it was too much to ask for. 

He snapped and got Sam’s attention. “Hey, hey,” he said. “How do we find him?”

Sam was quiet, still looking at Gabriel when Dean fully got his attention. “Uh...Don't know. No current address, no current employment. He still owes money on all his bills - phone, credit, utilities…”

“Collection agency flags?” Dean wondered out loud. 

Sam shook his head. “None in the system,” he muttered. 

“They just let him take a walk?” Castiel asked, frowning, as that didn’t sound like something anyone would let someone do. 

Sam nodded. “Seems like it. There's a work address from his last W-2, about a year ago. Let's start there.”

 

When it came time, Sam had told Dean and Cas to go on without them. Originally, Gabriel seemed to think it was their way of benching him but that simply wasn’t the case. Sam, actually, wanted to talk to the other and he’d told Dean and Cas to text them when it was important and they’d be there. He’d decided that he didn’t have to tell Gabriel about his visions but he could tell him everything else. Everything else Gabriel felt like he was missing. 

Gabriel was, currently, unpacking his things in the motel room, his headphones in so that he didn’t have to pay attention to Sam or when the others came back. He was more than a little hurt. He didn’t want this anymore. He didn’t want the secrets and the lies… he just wanted them to be honest with each other. Was that too much to ask?

At that moment, Sam gently pulled his earbud out, trying to get his attention after having been calling his name for a solid minute. “Gabe,” he said softly. “I want to talk to you,” he sighed. 

Gabriel turned around at that. He looked up at Sam, seeing the sincerity in his eyes. Was this the truth? Or was this going to be Sam telling him to stop prying? 

“Come sit down,” Sam gestured to the bed that he had already chosen for himself. He sat down before he looked to see Gabriel doing the same on the other end. He took a deep breath. “I don’t want you to think that we aren’t telling you things because we don’t care about you or because we haven’t… accepted you or something,” he started. 

Gabriel looked down and away. “That’s what it is truly beginning to feel like. Like I’m the one that no one asked for. I did kind of force myself into all this–”

“Gabe, that’s not what it is,” he shook his head, interrupting. “It’s not that we don’t want to talk about it with you… it’s that there are some things we don’t want to talk about at all,” he said before he sighed again and ran his hand through his hair. “When I was six months old… my mother burned to death in my nursery… pinned to the ceiling,” he began. “My father was… he was so pained with grief that the only forward he could see was finding out what had happened, what had killed her, and to kill it himself. I was… I was never for his crusade. No matter what we did… mom wasn’t going to come back. So I thought we could move on. I thought that’s what we should have been doing,” he shook his head. “But Dean and Dad didn’t believe in the same. So… I left. I went to Stanford when I got in. And I met a girl,” he smiled a little fondly. “Her name was Jessica. And she was beautiful…” he looked down. “I was… I thought I had it all. I was going to start law school, I was going to have a good job… I thought I could have the girl too. Until Dean came knocking…” he muttered. “Don’t get me wrong, I don’t blame him. Dean struggled with that for a little while but I’ve never blamed him for what happened to Jess. I’ve… only ever blamed myself…” he whispered as he looked down at his hands. 

And that was when it dawned on him. That was when he finally realized why he felt the undying need to protect Gabriel the way he did. Because… he was another Jess. Gabriel had, easily, become someone he cared about. And Sam had seen visions of her burning for weeks. He’d hoped they were just bad dreams. But if he had just listened, he might have been able to do  _ something _ . 

But Gabriel had been similar. He’d seen the other man in visions and so very close to death. He hadn’t been able to help him either… but somehow he’d gotten to him. He’d helped  _ save _ him and now here he was… alive and well. So he supposed he was… latching on to that. He refused to let the man go when he’d walked away from Jess so easily. He wouldn’t do that to Gabriel. 

“I had visions,” he said softly. “Of Jess’ death before it happened. I just thought they were bad dreams. Until I came home and found her pinned to the ceiling… just like my mom–”

“Just like that demon tried to do to Cas…” Gabriel whispered. He’d been sitting there, silently, just listening to Sam. Already, there was so much to take in, so much trauma to the poor Winchester  boy… he didn’t know what to say. 

Sam nodded. “Yeah… the demon was just trying to make a point… trying to complete a set, I guess. A few months before Cas kinda ran away with us… we met this kid. His name was Max Miller. He was like me only his power wasn’t visions, it was telekinesis. It was amazing… but how we found him was I saw him killing his father, killing other people. His mother, he told me, died the same way as mine. That’s how I knew how to look for this guy. I knew that he would have had something happen to him,” he sighed. 

Gabriel took it all in. He didn’t know what to say to Sam. He didn’t know what he was supposed to say in general. Was he to thank him for telling him the truth? No. Gabriel deserved the truth. Was he to console him? Did he need it? It was a lot that Sam was holding on his shoulders, he knew. But how did he make that better?

He looked down, thinking for a long time before he decided that he wanted to tell Sam the truth about the day Dean was stuck in the hospital dying. He wanted to tell the truth about where he’d taken his brother, what they’d done… what they learned. But he decided for something else. 

“My parents weren’t just simple… book store owners,” he started quietly. “We liked to pretend– some of us didn’t even know. But I did… and so did Cas. Along with my brother Michael,” he said as he looked down at his hands. “I don’t think the others did. If they did, they kept it to themselves.” 

Sam watched him as he turned silent, watching him as if he was debating how to continue. He breathed. “Gabe… you don’t have to tell me anything–”

“I want to,” he whispered as he turned and looked up at him. His eyes squinted a little, his thoughts still working behind them. “Have you ever seen the movie  _ The Da Vinci Code _ ?” he asked. 

Sam lifted an eyebrow before he nodded. “Uh… yeah?” he said in a questioning tone as if wondering what that had anything to do with what they were talking about. 

Gabriel chuckled a little, knowing he was going to sound completely crazy. “You know the scene… where the little girl– Sophie, I think her name was; she finds her grandfather doing questionable things in what looks like, in the movie, a sex ritual?” he asked, wondering if the other knew what he was talking about. When Sam nodded, he sucked in a breath. “That was our lives,” he whispered. “For a long time. I don’t think my parents knew we knew, or at least some of us did. When we were real little, my parents did stuff like that whenever. They figured we were too young to remember or to figure out that something out of the normal was going on, I guess. But we do. I remember coming downstairs when I was so very little, seeing my parents chanting something over a bowl of whatever,” he wrinkled his nose. “It was horrifying then… it still is. We never found out what they were doing. When Castiel caught them, old enough to say something to our other siblings… they stopped.”

Sam breathed. “Gabriel… that doesn’t sound like a very good environment for children. You were raised in that?” he asked. “Has Cas told Dean this?

Gabriel lifted an eyebrow, looking at him as if asking if he was serious. “Sam… your father raised you and your brother to be killers,” he said simply. “And no, I don’t think he has.”

Sam’s eyebrows flicked toward his hairline in agreement. “Touché,” he muttered before he gave a bit of a humorless chuckle. “Excuse my language… but we’ve had some fucked up things happen to us. Didn’t Cas say you don’t even remember your real parents?”

Gabriel laughed softly at his words. “Yeah, we did,” he mumbled before he shook his head. “No. None of us do. Seems impossible, right? My brothers were about the ages of five and six… I was three. Anna was… two? Castiel and Samandriel– they were just babies. They weren’t even walking yet. I remember carrying them down the road. I don’t know for how long. I can remember nothing before that… and then just  _ being _ there with my brother in my arms,” he said before he smiled downward. “I think it’s why I have such an attachment to Cas. I protected him. I carried him through rain and through people trying to find out where our parents were– through hunger and blistered feet. I carried him and he’s always been… mine to protect, mine to watch over… mine to carry.”

Sam blew out a breath as he listened to Gabriel. “My brother carried me out of the fire. When my mother…” he paused. “My father put me in Dean’s arms and told him to run… he carried me from the fire. You know you two have a lot in common than you think.”

“Yeah?” Gabriel asked, seeming to think about the parallels between their lives but he let it go. “So it’s me that should be dating your brother, not Cas?” he teased. 

“Well now, I didn’t say that. And you better not let Cas catch you saying that. Brother or not, he might stab you,” he joked… though he was only kind of joking. 

“Kidding,” he offered. “They’re disgustingly cute together and I like my men tall with puppy dog eyes,” he smirked as he bumped the other. 

As Sam went red, he realized what the other was doing and he took a pillow, whacking Gabriel with it. “You ass. We were having a nice, honest and sharing, moment and you had to go and cheapen it. You really  _ are _ like Dean.”

Gabriel laughed as he caught the pillow and caught it. He could do this. If they could all be honest with each other, he could definitely do this. He could be there with them. They could make the family they were always talking about. He could laugh with Sam and he could make it work with Dean. They could do this.  

A moment later was when Sam’s phone went off. “Hey, Cas and Dean got a line on Andy. Come on. They want us to meet them,” he said as he gestured toward the door. 

 

Castiel watched the outside of the building, waiting for this Andy to come out. He was lost in thought about their conversations from earlier. He was hearing Dean call his brother a freak over and over and all the time… wondering what it would sound like when Dean directed it toward him. But ultimately… his thoughts wandered over to what Gabriel had said about secrets. 

The words had made him feel guilty at the time. Because Gabriel was keeping secrets for him and for his sake, secrets he shouldn’t have had to keep. It was his fault and he knew the brothers would brand him a hypocrite once they found out. Or at least Dean would. 

But people shouldn’t throw stones in glass houses…

“Dean… when are we going to talk about it?” he asked. 

Dean frowned as he looked over at his boyfriend. He wondered what Castiel was talking about, what he had done wrong now. “Um… now?” he said with more of a question as he hoped it was the right response. 

Castiel wasn’t the kind of partner to just get mad at Dean. He didn’t do that… ‘I’m mad and you should know why’ thing. He said what he was angry about the second he was angry. He needed a reason and those reasons were usually pretty good. So what Cas was angry at… he didn’t know. 

Castiel rolled his eyes. “You’ve no idea what I’m talking about, do you?” he asked. 

“No, not a clue,” he shook his head immediately. 

Castiel huffed a laugh. “I really shouldn’t find your willingness to appease me as endearing as I do,” he said. 

“Does that mean I’m off the hook?” Dean gave a hopeful grin.

“Not a chance,” he scoffed before he sighed. “I’m talking about your Dad, Dean. No, not his death, before you get all uppity. I mean what he said to us. About Sam,” he whispered. “Gabriel was talking about keeping secrets,” he continued. “And he’s right. We’re keeping secrets from everyone. Sam doesn’t want to tell Gabriel about his visions, we don’t want to tell either of them what happened–”

“Cas,” he interrupted. “We… we did talk about this. We decided not to say anything,” he muttered. 

It wasn’t like they hadn’t talked about this at all. Right after John’s death, they had taken a moment to talk to each other about what he’d put on their shoulders, what he’d asked of them. And about whether or not they should tell the others.

Dean didn’t want to. Dean didn’t want Sam to lose what good memories he had of his father. He knew that as soon as they told his little brother what his father said, he wouldn’t be happy about it. He would grow to hate the memory of his father. And the wound of his death was so fresh… he couldn’t have Sam thinking those things. 

Truth be told, Dean had thought them. He didn’t want to. But when his father had thrust upon him the burden that he had… it made him wonder what kind of father he was. Why would he say those things? Why would he ask them of him and Cas?

“I know we did, Dean,” he sighed, looking off out the window as he broke Dean out of his thoughts. “I know we did. But the truth of the matter is that Gabriel is right: keeping secrets is wrong. Wouldn’t…” he trailed off as he paused, the question seeming to drift from what he was talking about to what he was thinking. “Good or bad, wouldn’t you want to know if someone was keeping that size of a secret from you?” he asked softly. 

Dean was silent as he thought about it. He supposed Castiel was right: he would want to be told if a secret of large proportions was being kept from him. Wouldn’t anyone?

“This is different, Cas,” he whispered. “This is…” he shook his head as he tried to find the best way to describe it. “Sam won’t understand– hell,  _ we _ still don’t even understand. How do you think he’s going to react when he hears that my father, he… that he…” Dean trailed off, swallowing. He couldn’t bring himself to say it. Not truly. Because it meant admitting to himself and everyone else that his father simply wasn’t the man he thought he’d been. “How do you tell someone that their own father said that about them?”

Castiel had many talents, he would say. But his specialty was seeing through Dean like he was transparent. Because to him, he was. Dean couldn’t hide the fact that it was less about Sam’s reaction and moreso the reaction Dean was still having. He was still coming to terms with the fact that his father had asked them to literally carry out a hit on Sam’s life, or so it felt. His request to kill Sam… it left them both confused and wondering where they went from there. But he knew that Dean was dealing with his father saying something so opposite of what he’d always told him. 

His whole life, John had told him to watch out for Sammy. He’d told him to take care of his little brother. He’d had to be mother and father and brother to the little boy. His whole life it was all he knew. Protect Sammy, forget everything else. So when John asked them to kill him if he… if he couldn’t be saved… it was like telling a kid that the family dog had to be put down and not giving him a reason as to why.

“I know this sucks, Dean. But Sam should know. Because you’re scared. I can see the way you look at him with this stuff. I see the way the wheels turn in your head. You’re afraid Sam is going to become something more and you need to talk to him about it,” Castiel said. 

Before Dean could respond, tell Castiel he was wrong even though he was right, the back door of the Impala opened. 

“Who are we talking to about what?” Sam asked as he and Gabriel slipped into the back. 

Immediately, Gabriel could sense that the air was charged with something and it wasn’t something good. He looked between the couple who’d suddenly grown silent. “Ooo… Why do I get the feeling we’ve interrupted something?” he asked. 

But of course, Gabriel’s words were redundant. They knew that it was exactly what they'd done. Dam and Gabriel made eye contact as if wondering where they went from there as their brothers grew quiet.

“I hope we didn't interrupt something important,” Sam muttered, getting the feeling that that was exactly what it was. And it was something he didn't know about, he was sure. So what were they hiding? What didn't they want Sam and Gabriel to know about?

He was about to ask something else, go into more depth… when someone came out of the building that was across the street. 

“That's Gallagher,” Castiel pointed. 

They all looked up to where Castiel was pointing, watching as the man came out of the apartment building in, what seemed to be, pajamas. They watched as he waved to the girl above– who was so  _ clearly _ out of his league– and then walked just a bit to a man where he seemed to simply…  _ ask _ for his cup of coffee and get it. 

The four of them gave each other a look, knowing that was odd and somewhat off but then went right back to watching Andy. It was when he moved down the street just a ways, going toward his van, that Sam stiffened. 

“That’s him,” he said suddenly. “That older guy, that’s him; that’s the shooter.”

Dean nodded. “Alright. You and Cas keep on him. Gabe and I will stick with Andy.”

They all nodded in response, Castiel and Sam getting out of their side of the car before Gabriel moved, skillfully slipping into the front seat. 

Sam looked back as their brothers drove after Andy and he looked over at Castiel, trying to seem unsuspicious to the man they were following but also concerned about what had been happening in the car before he and Gabriel had got there. He’d already had a heart to heart with one Novak today. What was another?

“So uh…” he began, looking around as they trailed the man. “You and Dean were talking about something kinda heavy before Gabe and I showed up… weren’t you?” he asked. 

Castiel swallowed hard as he looked up at Sam. He wanted to tell the man he considered a brother. He wanted to tell him everything. He wanted to let loose everything his own father had put on his and his brothers shoulders. But as soon as he caught those eyes… his throat closed up. Sam deserved to know what was going on more than anyone. But Sam also deserved not to have more weight thrust on his shoulders. 

“We were talking about the future,” he responded. It wasn’t a lie but it wasn’t the truth either. “And that gets as heavy as can be.” He looked down at the cement, deciding to deflect back to the other. “You and Gabriel are getting along again,” he prodded softly. “Did you tell him the truth? About the visions?” he wondered. 

Sam sucked in a breath. “I thought about it. For a really long time. I’ve been thinking about it… I can’t do it, Cas.”

Castiel frowned. “Why not? You think we should be honest with each other, don’t you–”

“Of  _ course _ I do,” he sighed as he ran his hand through his hair. “But how do you tell someone that you watched them be tortured… at their most vulnerable time and you did  _ nothing _ ?” he asked. 

“You didn’t do ‘nothing’, Sam,” he answered with air quotes. “You left. You starved yourself, you put yourself in danger– you did everything you could think of to see him again in your visions. Your abilities,” he started before he shook his head. “They don’t work like that. They’re not some sort of tracking device, you see them and you know where they are. And Gabriel will get that. I mean look at the things we had to go through just to find Andy.”

“But I didn’t even try to go through that with Gabe… I didn’t even try to look,” he whispered as he looked down, ashamed. 

“Probably because you had a feeling, some inkling, that you were not going to find him that way. And you wouldn’t have. Our mother didn’t die the way you describe. Hell… we don’t have any idea how our real parents died,” he sucked in a breath. “Besides. You got lucky. You saw the front of a bus, you had something to identify this town. You didn’t see that with Gabriel.”

Sam played with his fingers, looking from the man they were following to Cas. He wanted to ask the other what he was supposed to do if Gabriel didn’t forgive him. What was he supposed to do if the guy he was coming to know as a friend and another brother, maybe… just didn’t forgive him? What would he do then?

Of course he didn’t have time to think too much more about it when all of a sudden the man they’d been following got a phone call and Sam stiffened. “This is it,” he said to Castiel. “This is my vision. He gets that phone call,” he muttered, taking his hand and pulling him along. “Come on, come with me.”

Castiel let Sam pull him over to a gun store, remembering Sam’s retelling of his vision and how the man he’d been following simply shot someone he seemed to be rather close with and then shot himself. 

“Stay here,” Sam instructed before he went inside the gun shop. He looked around, wondering how he was going to relay to everyone that this was no longer a safe place without looking like a total loon. Something caught his eye, though and he made sure no one was looking as he pulled an alarm, the sirens going off immediately and as everyone looked up, he was slipping out. 

Castiel looked from Sam to the man they’d been following, looking at the disappointment that seemed to be on his face because the gun shop was clearly a no go. But instead, he turned and simply walked away. 

Castiel gave a sigh of relief and put his hand on his arm. “Good thinking,” he muttered as they walked down the steps, thinking it over. 

That was when a very familiar car came down the street, Sam and Cas expecting it to have their brothers in it… but all they saw was Andy on a cell phone and they were even more confused, so many questions. How had Andy gotten the Impala? Why did he have it? Were Gabriel and Dean alright?

The two looked at each other when they saw Andy driving the car and neither really knew what to do before Castiel picked up his phone and called his boyfriend, Sam watching the man he’d just saved get a phone call. 

“Dean, Andy has the impala,” Castiel announced as soon as he answered, putting the phone on speaker so that both he and Sam could hear them. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah, I know. We’re alright–”

“He sort of asked for it and Dean let him take it,” Gabriel said. 

“You what?” the two asked, immediately thinking he must have had a gun to their faces or something worse if they just  _ let _ him take the car that Dean loved. 

“He full on Obi-Wanned us. It’ mind control, man!”

“Well he Obi-Wanned  _ you _ ,” Gabriel pointed out. “I was wondering what the hell you were doing–”

“Shut up.”

Suddenly and all at once, Sam looked over as Dr. Jennings stepped on front of a bus that was going at full speed, effectively killing him right there in the center of town. Both Castiel and Sam were stood there awestruck as people started screaming and running around, scrambling to call the police. 

“Cas? Cas are you there? What’s going on?” Dean asked as he could hear yelling on the other line.

Castiel swallowed, not knowing what to say exactly. He didn’t know how to answer as he saw the man’s blood splayed out on the streets like it was supposed to be there. He’d seen a lot while being with the brothers. But this made him sick. He didn’t even know how to respond… so he simply handed the phone to Sam. 

 

Castiel laid there in his and Dean’s room, looking up at the ceiling as he contemplated everything about what had been going on. He thought about how he and Sam weren’t able to save the doctor. They thought they had. They had come so close. Only to come up shorthanded…

It was something he’d begun to grow used to. Of course… he wasn’t sure he’d ever get used to losing people who were practically in their grasps. It was a hard pill to swallow, but one he knew he had to take every once and awhile with the job they had. It was just something he had to live with. 

“ _ You're gonna learn… that we can't save everyone _ ,” Dean and Sam had told him when he first joined them. He just didn't realize how hard it would hit losing someone he didn't know. 

His thoughts weaved in and out of the things that had happened over the last few weeks. It was like a maze full of landmines. There were secrets being kept from everyone, everyone keeping those secrets– he wasn’t sure how much longer their little family could survive like this. He wasn’t sure how long he could keep it up. 

As if on cue, a knock came on the door and he sighed, knowing exactly who it was. He got up off the bed and opened the door to see his brother standing there. He didn’t need to say anything as he stepped outside and let Gabriel into the room. 

“Cassie, we need to talk,” he said. 

Castiel had been hanging out with Dean for too long. Granted, he was his boyfriend. But he knew it was true when he gave a humorless chuckle and shot him with an “Are you breaking up with me?”

Gabriel rolled his eyes and looked at his brother with a lifted eyebrow as if asking if he thought that was funny when he’d clearly been trying to talk about something serious. 

Castiel sighed. “Sorry, sorry,” he muttered as he sat down on the bed and gestured for the other to sit down at the table. “What do you want to talk about? Will I need beer to deal with it?”

“Your boyfriend is a bad influence and you’ve been spending too much time with him,” he said before he heaved a sigh and ran his fingers through his hair. He’d been thinking about what he wanted to say quite a bit. And yet? He knew not what he wanted to say to his brother. “Cassie… I think we should tell them. And don’t you dare ask me ‘tell them what?’ because you know what.”

Castiel hung his head for a moment. He wasn’t an idiot. Of course he knew what Gabriel had wanted to talk about. It was the same thing they’d been talking about for weeks. Going back and forth with each other until Cas would ultimately shut him down with a flimsy excuse… excuses he was running out of.

“Gabe–” he began but his brother cut him off. 

“No, Cas. You should have told Dean that day at the hospital exactly where we went. You shouldn’t have asked me to lie. You shouldn’t have lied–”

Castiel, listening to his brother, was furious as Gabriel talked. “You think I don’t  _ want  _ to tell Dean?” he asked as he stood, looming over his brother, his anger boiling in his veins. Gabriel had no idea what he was going through. He had no idea what it felt like to  _ lie _ to someone you love so unconditionally because the person who is supposed to feel the same might not find that love as unconditional as previously thought when he found out what Cas’ secret was.

On top of all that? He had to deal with the simple fact that he was told he wasn’t normal, for all intents and purposes, he wasn’t  _ human _ . Or at least a full one. He barely knew how to deal with that coupled with the fact that he was keeping it from the brothers… and right about now, Gabriel was not helping. “Think I want to lie to him? To Sam? You think I want to be lying about any of this?” he asked. 

Gabriel sighed as he thought about it. He knew this was going to turn into a screaming match. He knew that it was going to upset his brother. But he was done hiding and Castiel needed to know that. 

He stood, meeting his brother eye to eye, but keeping his voice as calm as he could. “Of course not, Cas. I don’t think you  _ want  _ to. But I think it’s time we came clean about it. Sam and I–”

“Well I’m glad you and Sam had a wonderful talk, Gabriel. I’m glad you did,” he spat a little as he came closer to him. “But you didn’t tell Sam  _ everything _ either. And for that matter, he’s not telling you everything! We’re all keeping secrets,” he said gruffly, getting angrier and angrier the more he thought it over. “How the fuck do you think I should tell my boyfriend, the man that I gave up my entire life for, the man that I want to spend the rest of my life with, the man that I just want to be with…” he trailed off as he shook his head. “How do I tell him that me, his supposedly human boyfriend… that I don’t have a soul?” he asked his brother. He gave a humorless laugh as he pulled back, trying not to let the tears in his eyes fall. His hands, they shook at this point, the anger enough to do that do him He’d been thinking about this so much and still it got to him. The last thing he wanted to do… was lose Dean. “If you’ve got a way for him to not  _ completely _ overreact, please share with the goddamn class, Gabriel.”

Gabriel watched as his brother broke down over what they were talking about. He had so many questions. What else was Castiel keeping from them? What else was Sam keeping from him? Why were they doing this dance? He reached out to ask him, to calm him down– to do _ something _ . 

Gabriel jumped a little when Castiel’s phone suddenly went off, signifying Dean’s ringtone. 

The blue-eyed man wiped his tears as if Dean would be able to hear them in his voice as he answered the phone. “Hey, baby,” he said softly. 

“Sam had another vision. I’m on the way now. I’ll text you the coordinates. Meet me,” he said. 

Castiel hung up the phone a moment later. “Grab your stuff. We have to go,” he muttered, gesturing for the door. 

 

Sam stood from where he and Andy sat in the alley, the three of them getting out of the car. 

“Picked up some stragglers,” Dean said as the two got out with him. “Victim's name was Holly Beckett, forty-one, single,” he announced. 

Sam looked to Andy. “Who is she?” he wondered. 

Andy shook his head, seemingly confused about the adding of people. He’d seen one earlier but there was more? “Uh… never heard of her,” he answered. 

Castiel nodded slightly. “Called Ash on the way over here; he came up with a little something. Apparently Holly Beckett gave birth when she was eighteen years old, back in 1983. Same day you were born, Andy,” he offered. 

It was clear that Andy wanted to ask how he knew that, someone he didn’t know. But if he was with Sam and Dean, he knew that they would have done research right along side Sam, who had been telling him about everything. But it was still weird to be told about your own life by someone you don’t even know. 

“Andy… were you adopted?” Sam asked.

“Well… yeah,” he responded. 

Dean gave Andy a look as if he’d left something convenient out. “You were? And you neglected to mention that?” he asked. 

Andy returned the look with one of his own, as if asking Dean if he was serious. “Never really came up. I mean, I, I never knew my birth parents, and, and like you said my adopted mom died when I was a baby– do you, do you think this Holly woman could actually be my m–” he began but Dean cut him off.

“I don't know,” he said as he shook his head. “I tried to get a copy of the birth records, but they're hard copy only, sealed in the county office.”

Andy gave a look. “Well screw that,” he muttered. 

 

It had been a long night. It had started when they went to the county office, figuring out that the woman that died in the fire… she had indeed been Andy’s mother. Even more than that, the doctor he knew was the one that oversaw the adoption of not only him… but his twin. It was hard for Andy to wrap his head around, claiming he had an evil twin. What was worse? Finding out that it was the guy he’d let into his life and trusted. 

Ansen Weems was his name. Of course, Andy… he knew him as Weber. They’d been on their way to confront him when Sam got a vision, seeing the girl that seemed close to Andy jumping off the ledge to a dam. It was just like the others, more death. 

They raced to stop it from happening, and they did… Weems, or Weber, had ended up dead in the street. 

By the time the cops showed up and everything beginning to look up, the light of the dawn had broken, Andy convincing the cops that he shot himself, somehow. And that the cops had seen it. 

Sam sat there, a paramedic tending to his shoulder as he watched Andy talk to them, watching as they nodded and he turned away, all of them seeming just fine with everything. 

“Look at him,” Sam muttered as the paramedic walked away. “He’s getting better at it.”

“Don’t know if that’s a good thing or something we need to be worried about,” Gabriel offered in response. 

They watched as Andy went by the ambulance where Tracy was wrapped in a blanket. They saw him look in her direction and her do everything but look in his. She looked around like she was looking for someone or something but she wouldn’t look at Andy. 

The guy seemed a little heartbroken as he walked closer to the four of them. Andy made a noise, like a forced laugh but they could all tell there was no humor behind it. How could there be at this point? “She won’t even look at me…”

“Yeah,” Castiel nodded. “She’s pretty shaken up.”

Andy shook his head. “No, it's, this is different. It's, uh, I never, I never used my mind thing on her before. Before last night. She's scared of me now,” he whispered, looking away from them as if he was ashamed. 

Castiel wanted to comfort him, tell him that he did what he had to. He needed to save her life and he had. But that was like telling him that Dean would love him anyway if he found out his secret. He was too caught in his own head to really believe it. 

Sam was the one that spoke up, clearing his throat. “Hey, Andy, I hate to do this, but um, we have to get out of here. Here. I wrote down my cell. You don't have to be alone in this, all right? If anything comes up, just call me up,” he said as he handed over a piece of paper with his own phone number on it. 

Andy looked dumbfounded as they told him that they were leaving. He took the piece of paper but he held his arms out as if asking them what was going on. How was he going to continue? “Wha- what am I supposed to do now?” he asked. 

“You be good, Andy,” Dean said. “Or we’ll come back.”

Castiel looked to his boyfriend, the words leaving him a little uneasy about the way he was handling the situation. He wondered if he would be any different. If Dean’s love for him would make the circumstances different… or if it would just make it worse. 

As they walked away, Castiel could hear Dean and Sam going back and forth in their conversation, though he wasn’t paying attention as he crossed his arms over his body. He was to caught up in his own head. That was until the reached the impala and Dean’s cell phone rang. 

“Hello? Ellen,” he said, he and Castiel making eye contact as if having a silent conversation. “What's going on? ...Yeah, we'll be right there,” he nodded before he hung up, the rest of them getting in the car like they knew it was time to go. 

The ride passed by in a blur. Castiel didn’t really know what was going on, none of them seemed to until they got there. It was only when the four of them were sitting at the bar, waiting for Ellen, did anyone talk.

“Jo?” Ellen called from behind the bar, chucking her chin at her when the other looked at her. “Go pull up another case of beer.”

Jo quickly recognized the tone in her mother's voice, sensing that she was sending her out of the room for a reason she didn’t understand. “Mom…” she tried. 

“Now. Please,” Ellen said. 

As Jo left, Ellen leaned down in front of the four of them, something in their eyes that none of them really knew. But she looked at all of them before she spoke, knowing that it was going to come from one of them. “So. You uh, you want to tell me about this last hunt of yours?” she asked. 

“No. Not really,” Dean muttered as he noticed Sam about to answer. No matter what had happened, no matter how she’d helped them over the past few weeks… she wasn’t family. Hell, Dean was still having a hard time remembering  _ Gabe _ as family. They were working on it. But he didn’t know her. Not yet. “No offense, it's just kind of a family thing,” he said as he took a sip of his beer. 

Castiel noticed Ellen get slightly angry at the way Dean talked to her. He had the thought of telling her that it was sort of how Dean talked to everyone he didn’t  _ really _ know. But he thought better when he realized it probably wouldn’t make her feel better. 

“Not anymore,” she insisted as she reached under the bar. They looked on as she smacked a folder on the bar, looking to all four of them. “I got this stuff from Ash. Andrew Gallagher's house burnt down on his six month birthday, just like your house. You think it was the demon both times, don't you? You think it went after Gallagher's family?”

“Yeah, we think so–”

“Sam,” Dean cut off, not needing the other to talk about this. He may have feared his brother in some ways but he was still going to protect him. He was still going to protect him with everything he had in him. So Sam talking about all this to a woman they didn’t know? A woman who ran a hunter’s bar… it was open season when they found out he was more than human. 

“Why?” Ellen asked. 

“None of your business,” Dean said before Sam could say anything else. He knew Sam was the only one who he had to catch. Gabriel didn’t know enough and Cas would never say anything.

At Dean’s words, the woman seemed to turn on Dean, a look in her eyes that struck him… and suddenly Ellen reminded him of someone. “You mind your tongue with me, boy. This isn't just your war, this is war,” she pointed out and Dean knew. She was telling him the same thing his father would have. He swallowed, continuing to listen but even then… he knew his fight was over. And he knew Sam would spill everything. “Now, something big and bad 's coming and it's coming fast, and their side holds all the cards. Now, at best all we got is us. Together. No secrets or half-truths here.”

There was a pause before Sam sucked in a breath, looking to his brother and knowing that when Dean gave him a certain nod, he could do as he pleased. “There are people out there, like Andy Gallagher, like me. And um ... we all have some kind of ability,” he tried to explain, finding it harder to talk about than he really thought it would be. 

Ellen shook her head. “Ability?” she inquired. 

“Yeah. Psychic ability. Me, I have, um, I have visions,” he said. 

Ellen looked at the others and they all looked back as if to tell her that a step in the wrong direction meant no mercy from their family. Sam continued. 

“Premonitions. I don't know, it's, it's different for everybody. The demon said he had plans for people like us.”

“What kind of plans?” She asked.

“We don't really know for sure–”

“These people out there, these psychics – they dangerous?” she inquired immediately.

“No,” Castiel answered at the same time Dean did. Because he would be damned if this Ellen woman pulled anything on the boy he thought of as a brother. Not when they were trusting her. Not when Sam wasn’t dangerous.  

“Not all of them,” Dean muttered.

“But some are,” Sam said with a nod, as if telling his brother not to sugar coat things. They needed to tell the truth, like Ellen said. “Some are very dangerous.”

“Okay, how many of them are we looking at?”

“We've been able to track a clear pattern so far. They've all had house fires on the night of the kid's six month birthday,” Dean answered. 

“That's not true,” Castiel informed, the lot of them turning on him as soon as he said it. 

“What?” Dean and Sam asked together. 

“Weber? Or Ansen Weems, or whatever his name is– I looked at his files, and there was no house fire. There's nothing out of the ordinary,” Castiel whispered. He’d planned to tell the brothers, to tell Gabriel. But of course, he hadn’t had time before they’d been racing to the roadhouse.

It seemed to click for the barkeep immediately. “Which breaks pattern,” she pieced as Jo came up behind her with that case of beer. “So if there's any others like him, there'd be nothing in the system. No way to track 'em all down.”

Dean, understanding the gravity of the situation, looked off into space as he thought about it all. He thought about what it meant for them, what they might be facing. “And so who knows how many of 'em are really out there…” he whispered, the unanswered question like more being piled onto their already burdened shoulders. 

They were quiet a moment, Ellen looking between them. She didn’t know what all was going on in their heads. She didn’t know that Dean was fearing that his brother was going to become like every other murdering little psycho they tracked down. She couldn’t know that Gabriel and Sam were fearing more for the state of their family than ever before, not knowing what could happen. And she certainly couldn’t understand that Castiel was still harboring a secret that to tell Dean… meant to face a world he might not have been ready for yet. But whatever was going on, Ellen could tell that all four men were sitting there, fearing something all together even if in different ways; they all feared the unknown, of what came next. 

She swallowed before she spoke again. “Jo, honey?”

“Yeah?” the young girl answered. 

“You'd better break out the whiskey instead.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> So what did you expect? Did y'all see that coming? I didn't really think you did. Your guesses were all made in the comments but I knew I could get you with a little trick up my sleeve ;)


End file.
